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Connecting to vatsim using an iPhone hotspot with Verizon LT


Scott Brady
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Scott Brady
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Is it possible to connect vatsim through an iPhone Verizon hotspot on my omen pc brand new? I am thinking about moving and I won’t have cable internet. Are there any other options?

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Johnny Coughlan
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For ATC?, Flying?.

 

Cellular connection 2G?, 3G?, 4G?, 5G?.

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Brad Littlejohn
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I will say yes. Here's why.

 

/me sits back in a rocking chair

 

Back in my day, when this thingamajobber called VATSIM was tinier than a caterpillar and all it wanted to do was be the airplane version of Thomas the Tank Engine, there were these old prittta...prost...prog..no protocols! Yeah, that's the word! Protocols like DSL or ISDN, or WYSIWYG...

 

/me looks away

 

What did you say, son? That isn't a protocol!? This is my story, hurry up and bring me my coffee!!!

 

Okay.. where was I? Oh yeah.. protocols.. Well, some of us couldn't even afford those back in that time, so we had these little green sticks that wen.. cards! That's right, cards that were slotted into a PCI or even an ISA slot in your PC that would just tap your phone line..

 

/me looks away again

 

I know what they are called! You haven't even seen them, let alone used a telephone, son! I know what I'm gonna do if you keep interrupting me! I'm going to make a Reaction video of you trying to figure out how to use a rotary phone and posted it on Youtube! Now hurry up with that coffee!!!

 

MODEMs. That's what some of us used. Even as slow as a 33.6K modem was used to connect to here, and we were perfectly fine with ATC and traffic, especially during fly-ins.

 

If your hockey puck... I mean, hot spot can run faster than that, then you should be okay. Other than that, I'd say....zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

 

 

BL.

Brad Littlejohn

ZLA Senior Controller

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Scott Brady
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I will be flying not controlling

Edited by Guest
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Ross Carlson
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In theory, it should work, but you will likely run into problems with the connection to the voice server timing out, because you probably can't get into the router settings of the phone's hotspot and forward the voice ports to your computer.

 

There may also be latency issues that might make voice transmissions sound broken and unreadable. It'll depend on how good your cellular connection is, and how Verizon prioritizes traffic on the cell tower, etc.

 

Might have to go text-only.

 

Then again, it might work just fine. Give it a try.

Developer: vPilot, VRC, vSTARS, vERAM, VAT-Spy

Senior Controller, Boston Virtual ARTCC

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Robert Shearman Jr
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Are there any other options?

I've heard you can get internet service through satellite TV providers, but, I've also heard it's not inexpensive.

Cheers,
-R.

fvJfs7z.png

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Brad Littlejohn
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I will be flying not controlling

 

You'll be fine. I was controlling as well as flying with FS9 on a 33.6K modem. 3G offers faster speeds than that so you'll be plenty fine.

 

BL.

Brad Littlejohn

ZLA Senior Controller

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Ross Carlson
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Just watch out for the voice timeout problem I mentioned.

Developer: vPilot, VRC, vSTARS, vERAM, VAT-Spy

Senior Controller, Boston Virtual ARTCC

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Brad Littlejohn
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Just watch out for the voice timeout problem I mentioned.

 

Agreed. Since this would be coming off of a hotspot, connectivity to that hotspot would more than likely be through WiFi, so you're already going to have latency to the hotspot, then even more latency from the hotpot out to the closest tower. With using a modem, my PC was connected to my linux box via NAT over a 10/100 switch, then out through the modem. So each step was hardwired and dedicated, despite the slow speeds.

 

The hotspot would technically (at least on paper) be faster, but speed will be limited to WiFi speeds to the hotpot, and then at least 3G out, so expect some latency.

 

BL.

Brad Littlejohn

ZLA Senior Controller

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Ross Carlson
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The timeout issue is different from latency. When you make a connection to the voice server, the voice data flows over the UDP protocol, and your router "punches a hole" in your firewall to allow the incoming UDP data from the server to get through. As long as that hole stays open, you will be able to hear ATC or other pilots talking. Most routers will close that hole if no traffic is sent from inside the router out to the internet within a certain timeout period. Some routers set this value really short, like 30 seconds, some set it to much longer, some are in between, etc. The way we usually tell people to get around this issue is to set up port forwarding for UDP port 3290. This byp[Mod - Happy Thoughts]es the UDP timeout issue by essentially creating a permanent hole in the firewall just for that one port.

 

With a WiFi hotspot, which is acting as the router, you probably can't get in and set up port forwarding rules like that, so you'd be subject to the UDP timeout problem. I can set up port forwarding on my Verizon MiFi JetPack hotspot, but I don't know if it's doable on the iPhone that the OP is using.

Developer: vPilot, VRC, vSTARS, vERAM, VAT-Spy

Senior Controller, Boston Virtual ARTCC

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Scott Brady
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Great info thank you guys. We’ll give it a shot.

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Scott Brady
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I tested everything thing today using an iPad hot spot with Verizon at 2 bars of signal and everything seemed to work fine. I’ll check back after I use this for a while and see if things change when busy etc...

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